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To: nathanbedford
"If you can only find a real live judge somewhere who agrees with you, you might just hear him say that you have a point."

So far I have only been able to find real dead judges.

MINOR V. HAPPERSETT IS BINDING PRECEDENT AS TO THE CONSTITUTIONAL DEFINITION OF A NATURAL BORN CITIZEN.

134 posted on 05/11/2016 3:03:48 PM PDT by Godebert (CRUZ: Born in a foreign land to a foreign father.)
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To: Godebert; nathanbedford
There is a simple argument against Minor vs. Happersett being a "binding precedent." Like many legal arguments, it is an argument by analogy.

From Wikipedia: "In common language usage, 'fruit' normally means the fleshy seed-associated structures of a plant that are sweet or sour, and edible in the raw state, such as apples, bananas, grapes, lemons, oranges, and strawberries. On the other hand, in botanical usage, 'fruit' includes many structures that are not commonly called 'fruits', such as bean pods, corn kernels, tomatoes, and wheat grains."

Watch carefully now. If a court with jurisdiction had been called upon to decide whether a tomato is a "fruit" and so decides, that is not a decision as to whether an apple or a raspberry or a blueberry is also a "fruit." To be a "fruit," an apple or a raspberry or a blueberry need only meet the common definition and meaning of "fruit" and none need be a tomato in order to be a "fruit."

The binding precedent of Minor vs. Happersett is that Virginia Minor had no 14th Amendment "right to vote" although she was a citizen because no man and no woman of any description or citizenship had such a "right." That the SCOTUS found that Virginia Minor (apparently an aggressive feminist legal troublemaker with a lawyer husband, demanding allegedly under the 14th Amendment, her alleged "right to vote") in a decision handed down in the period shortly after the War Between the States, noted that she had been born on American soil and that both of her parents had been American citizens, that she herself was a citizen and therefore had standing to seek judicial relief (standing ONLY), then proceeded to make mincemeat of her claim.

As to her citizenship, the court found that the term Natural Born Citizen is nowhere defined in the Constitution but had some prior presence in common law (judge made law prior to the enactment of the 14th Amendment). It also noted that since she had been born of American citizens on American soil, she was a citizen by the strictest standards. That does not mean anything other than what it says. It makes no observation as to whether she would be NBC if only one parent had been an American citizen or if she had been born of one or two American citizens abroad. In fact, SCOTUS specifically declined to determine such the answers to such questions.

That Virginia Minor was a citizen was a preliminary finding as to her credentials to have standing, a preliminary matter without which the case would be dismissed for lack of plaintiff's standing, depriving the SCOTUS of any jurisdiction whatsoever. That she had natural born citizenship does not mean that those with different credential did not and the SCOTUS pointedly refused to rule on such totally extraneous questions.

137 posted on 05/11/2016 4:25:05 PM PDT by BlackElk (Dean of Discipline Tomas de Torquemada Gentlemen's Society: Rack 'em Danno!)
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